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Topic: causes of "bready" crust? (Read 1522 times)

I'm new to the forum...but have been on a quest to make the perfect pizza for the past year or two. Perhaps this question has been answered somewhere on the forum, but I could not find it.

I feel like I'm getting close to perfect (my wife says I'm there, but I think she just wants to eat something besides pizza!), but my cornicione is a little "breadier" than I'd like. The crumb is a little dense in spots, and is not as airy and chewy as I would like. What are the causes of dough that is too bready?

I've done some searching on the forum, and it seems that two common causes are: 1) over-kneading the dough, and 2) dough that is too dry.

Are there any other things that might cause this?

I cook in an electric oven that can only reach 500 degrees F (outdoor pizza oven will be built this summer!). I cook directly on a stone with another stone on the rack directly above.

I make a sourdough crust and am shooting for something that's approximately New York style. Here's the approximate recipe, although I found that I had to add quite a bit more flour while mixing to get the correct consistency. It still ended up to be a pretty moist dough.

Mix on low speed in kitchenaid with dough hook on low (1) for 4 minutes. Let sit for five minutes. Mixed for another 10-12 (?) minutes as I added more flour to achieve the correct consistency (dough was very wet). Divide into two balls, coat with olive oil, and put in ziplock bags. Let sit on counter for 15 minutes. Put in refrigerator overnight. Take out of refrigerator 2 hours before cooking.

I get pretty decent oven spring, but as I stated earlier, it's a little breadier than I would like.

Any thoughts on how to achieve a less bready, chewy crust would be much appreciated! Thanks!

I haven't been doing sourdough lately, but that looks like an awful lot of starter that you are using. Personally I never used nearly that much, but there are others on the forum who are regular sourdough people, I'm sure someone will chime in.

I haven't been doing sourdough lately, but that looks like an awful lot of starter that you are using. Personally I never used nearly that much, but there are others on the forum who are regular sourdough people, I'm sure someone will chime in.

I calculate that Matt is using around 2.1% sugar and around 2.84% oil. Those two ingredients will lead to a more tender, bread-like crumb but they are not far out of line. Maybe reducing the amount of natural poolish and lowering, or even omitting, the sugar and olive oil might lead to a less bready crumb. Matt might even use the preferment dough calculating tool at http://www.pizzamaking.com/preferment_calculator.html to do all of the number crunching for him if he decides to modify his dough formulation.

This is high tech! I REALLY appreciate the advice...I think this will help me step up my pizza game! I like that preferment calculator, and I also feel lucky that the next post after mine in this forum was about the thickness factor. This will take a while to digest...I never knew pizza making was so high tech! (My friends make fun of my scale). It sounds like my next steps are to reduce the oil, sugar, and poolish, and see what happens. Thanks again for the help! I might resurrect this thread once I find out what happens.

I adjusted my recipe last night (less oil and sugar, more water, and less starter) and the results were in the direction I was hoping for. Still not perfect, although I don't know if I'll ever achieve perfection (which is a good thing!). I also did not go high-tech yet and start using the calculators, but that's a project for when I have more time.

I adjusted my recipe last night (less oil and sugar, more water, and less starter) and the results were in the direction I was hoping for. Still not perfect, although I don't know if I'll ever achieve perfection (which is a good thing!). I also did not go high-tech yet and start using the calculators, but that's a project for when I have more time.

Matt

imo, any pizza cooked in my home oven at anything under 550º comes out 'bready' even if i use no oil and have perfect dough. i do bake on a screen exclusively due to it being an electric oven. if you want, PM me your recipe and process and i'll compare it to what i've baked at 500 and less to see if i can narrow it down

in the meantime, i ran the percentages on the recipe you posted above (assuming you are at 50/50 by weight on the starter)

810g 100% ATHG474g 58.5% W13g 1.6% Sa17g 2.1% Su23g 2.8% OO

now, water would be fine there, i should think. salt is good, oil is a little up on the amount but still fine. sugar, hard to say. how you proof your dough and how you bake it is going to play more of a factor than just that. lower temps, longer cold ferments, it may help.

100% flour* try using 12% starter and a counter top rise, not sure how active your starter is (calculate it in to the flour/water)60% water* and whether or not you 'feed' it when you make the dough or use it already fed and highly active1.6% salt1% sugar1.5% OO

starter and sugar in your mixing bowl. incorporate the sugar into your starter. mix the salt into your flour. add your flour, and then your water. start your mixing. when your dough is mixed together (~2-5min) but still not uniform (you have no flour and water unmixed) add your oil. if you have to scrape the bowl with a spatula during mixing, i see no issues with this. the dough will start to smooth out at some point, keep track of the time. i would guess 7-10 minutes total. take your dough out, place it on a lightly oiled (or floured if it's very 'wet' to you) and do a stretch and fold to build tension. place the dough to rest in an oiled bowl, let sit for half an hour or so. divide to your ball amounts if making more than one ball. try this:

start at 5 minute mark. http://youtu.be/Ju3MEV-dQ0A?for your balling method. place into oiled cool whip containers (the big ones) and let sit on the counter. i would assume this around a 24 hour recipe, but adjust your water temp and starter amount based on trial and error from one single test batch. if it rises too fast, throw it in the fridge. too slow, place in a warmer place. i am a big fan of an oven with the light on

and edit again:

i've had luck with using a few % of egg in my dough. store eggs don't give the flavor that real home laid eggs do, but for 1000g of flour using a 70g home egg really seems to work fine for me. the eggs are a little more 'wet' than store eggs so i use around 55% total water, and aim for ~60% hydration with the HG flour i use.